On October 1, 1919, all eyes were on the mound when Chicago White Sox pitcher Eddie Cicotte threw a pitch during Game 1 of the World Series. It would be the most consequential pitch of Cicotte’s life. The ball hit Cincinnati Reds leadoff hitter Morrie Rath squarely in the back. Though the spectators didn’t know it at the time, the pitch was a signal to the gambling world: the fix was in.

The 1919 World Series was the stage for one of the most notorious sports scandals of all time. Later known as the “Black Sox,” eight players from the South Side team threw the World Series in exchange for payoffs from a gambling ring. The result was what is sometimes called “baseball’s original sin” – a betrayal of their fans as well as their teammates, the so-called “Clean Sox” players who were not involved.

“Cheating to win a game is one thing,” Northwestern University professor Bill Savage told Chicago Stories. “Cheating to lose is betraying the essence of what a game is supposed to be. And the Black Sox Scandal had in it all of the ingredients of Greek tragedy” – including towering figures such as White Sox owner Charles Comiskey and... Read more

A wild pitch. A low throw. A dropped fly ball. The Chicago White Sox, whose scandal earned them the nickname “The Black Sox,” were not playing their usual brand of winning baseball in the 1919 World Series. Later, it was discovered that several players had accepted money in exchange for throwing the series in favor of the Cincinnati Reds. But how did they manage to fix the series without it being too obvious?

It’s hard to say – especially more than a century later – which plays were on the level and which were part of the fix. Many of the players admitted to taking money, but several denied that they did anything intentional on the field to lose... Read more